Same here, I always have my vinyl.
But this one time, at band camp, when the power went out, I was forced to play solitair with real cards.
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iTunes Match Users Frustratingly Report Widespread Issues [Updated]
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Same here, I always have my vinyl.
But this one time, at band camp, when the power went out, I was forced to play solitair with real cards.
Just found this thread. FWIW, the Apple System Status for Canada page shows a green dot for iTunes Match. Not sure if it was, or ever has been, any other colour:
Not a fan of Apple online services, based on stuff going missing, or files stuck forever inside the ecosystem, and services having unacknowledged problems. It's as though there is a whole different company running the back-end, made up of people desperately trying to hide mistakes, who don't empower their support staff to escalate problems.
I tried to be an all-Apple person, but the pain, loss, and aggravation was too much. I really feel for all of you Match users who had their music libraries corrupted. You deserve a lot better.
Not a fan of Apple online services, based on stuff going missing, or files stuck forever inside the ecosystem, and services having unacknowledged problems. It's as though there is a whole different company running the back-end, made up of people desperately trying to hide mistakes, who don't empower their support staff to escalate problems.
I tried to be an all-Apple person, but the pain, loss, and aggravation was too much. I really feel for all of you Match users who had their music libraries corrupted. You deserve a lot better.
I have to be honest, I don't have any sympathy for those who lose any digital media. Apple actually make it very easy to back your stuff up. It's called Time Machine, and even then, there are countless other 3rd party options, or, you can simply just drag and drop (copy) your iTunes library onto another hard drive (€100 for a 4TB on Amazon) and put it in a drawer before you give cloud services like Match a go. If they fail, which they have, again, simply roll back. Been there, done that, library butchered a few years ago, but nothing lost. I also don't have time for such problems in the future, so I instead bought a 128GB 1st Gen iPhone SE for €500 which holds about 15k tracks, enough to keep me amused for a long time, offline. Some of those tracks include a few of my prized vinyls which I digitised myself because they're not commercially available in digital format. So yea, all the music I care about is pretty safe.
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Not only is iTunes Match not a backup service - it is in fact the opposite of a backup service. It's a service which can silently corrupt your data.
How do I know whether Match has corrupted my library or not? If it has corrupted my library then have the backups to my library been corrupted as well - since I didn't spot the corruption in time?
I wish the Music app had an option related to iTunes Match which said "Consider this iTunes library to be the master and don't overwrite any local content. Ever."
How do I know whether Match has corrupted my library or not? If it has corrupted my library then have the backups to my library been corrupted as well - since I didn't spot the corruption in time?
I wish the Music app had an option related to iTunes Match which said "Consider this iTunes library to be the master and don't overwrite any local content. Ever."
Yes, and also should have the option of "do not match these library and instead upload my own copies".
That would make it a backup service.
Very good idea. Why can’t Match work like most photo editing apps? leave the original untouched.
One of the original benefits advertised for iTunes Match is that it would let you replace those old 128kbps MP3s with much higher quality 256kbps AAC files.
I was able to do this for much of my old library, but the problem is occasionally the WRONG track is matched, so for example an uncensored version of a song is replaced with a censored one, or the original recording is replaced with a re-recording that sucks.
Once I discovered this can happen, I started checking tracks before replacing them, by listening on my phone (which would listen to the matched version) before deleting from my local library.
Apple Music makes iTunes Match mostly moot, but there's still a prized collection of music that I want to have permanent (unrented) copies of. Also some tracks aren't available at all in Apple Music; one example being much of Eddy Grant's discography. For this, iTunes Match is the only option.
I have to wonder what Match would do if I had to upload some of the vinyls I digitised that may well have a modern version. I actually like and want to keep the subtle crackling in the background, among other things.
I don’t know about you, but I never had any 128kbps mp3 files. I wouldn’t be caught dead with that crap.
I got into the MP3 game very early, as in, 1996. At the time, due to hard drives not being that big and it being a new thing, 128kbps MP3s were the standard in quality.
I quickly built up a huge collection of 128kbps MP3s, to the tune of about 25GB by the late 90s. It was nice to have iTunes Match to be able to upgrade my favorites among these songs.
I understand. I was in the mp3 game early also. I dumped all the 128kbps mp3s I had because of the horrible sound quality and never looked back.
Sick and tired of Apple!
Just received a ridiculous reply from Apple Support saying that they won’t refund an album I purchased a couple of years ago, which has miraculously been renamed and since that happened, I can access only 5 out of 40 tracks!
They suggested I should have backed up my purchases from iTunes…..
GREAT !!!!!
Well done Apple.
That was the end of iTunes for me.
Just received a ridiculous reply from Apple Support saying that they won’t refund an album I purchased a couple of years ago, which has miraculously been renamed and since that happened, I can access only 5 out of 40 tracks!
They suggested I should have backed up my purchases from iTunes…..
GREAT !!!!!
Well done Apple.
That was the end of iTunes for me.
This app will track every change to your library. In my experience there's been only metadata tweaks.
Of course, it won't tell you if tracks were mismatched in the first place. I guess you'll have to work that our yourself.
They do say, in the T’a & C’s, that purchases can be re-downloaded from the store, if still available. They also suggest using Time Machine to back up your local copies. You did that, right?
I've currated over 140GB of songs in iTunes Match since 2011. Within the last 10 years, I've seen some weird behavior.
-I've had my iPod/iPhone demand I be online to play locally stored tracks. This is the whole f****g reason I curated my own library. I have no idea when/where I'll have internet access, so I don't want to be tethered to a streaming service.
-Often Album art will disappear or the wrong album art will be displayed.
-Entire Albums/Tracks I've purchased in iTunes Store have vanished months/years later. That is, The album/tracks no longer appear in my library & also don't appear in the iTunes Store anymore.
-Integrating Music App (formally iTunes) into home/theatre system is probematic at best. AirPlay constantly cuts out or dies altogether. Tracks skip, repeat.
-When family/friends come over, I have to babysit Music app bc music volume varies widely. Too quiet for one song, too loud for the next.
I'm reluctant to pull the lever & switch to Apple Music due to the litany other issues I've read in this/other threads. Is there a utility to migrate existing playlists to other systems like Spotify? In closing, back in 2005 I switched to Apple, wrongly believing they were experts in music creation/curation. I regret that decision & sticking with them for so long.
-I've had my iPod/iPhone demand I be online to play locally stored tracks. This is the whole f****g reason I curated my own library. I have no idea when/where I'll have internet access, so I don't want to be tethered to a streaming service.
-Often Album art will disappear or the wrong album art will be displayed.
-Entire Albums/Tracks I've purchased in iTunes Store have vanished months/years later. That is, The album/tracks no longer appear in my library & also don't appear in the iTunes Store anymore.
-Integrating Music App (formally iTunes) into home/theatre system is probematic at best. AirPlay constantly cuts out or dies altogether. Tracks skip, repeat.
-When family/friends come over, I have to babysit Music app bc music volume varies widely. Too quiet for one song, too loud for the next.
I'm reluctant to pull the lever & switch to Apple Music due to the litany other issues I've read in this/other threads. Is there a utility to migrate existing playlists to other systems like Spotify? In closing, back in 2005 I switched to Apple, wrongly believing they were experts in music creation/curation. I regret that decision & sticking with them for so long.
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I have read throughout the years of people having problems with iTunes Match/Apple Music changing their personal music libraries stored on their computers. To my knowledge, I have not had any of these issues… but I can tell you that if I ever discover iTunes Match has done this, I will immediately cancel my iTunes Match and Apple Music subscriptions and never return. My music library is too valuable to let anyone mess with it. Too many hours invested.
The main problem I’ve had over many years is with Siri’s inability to search for, find, and play the album or song I ask it to. Even after discovering the “my albums” command to tell Siri to search my iTunes Match library and not my Apple Music library, I still have problems with Siri being able to identify my albums. The problem is less problematic on iPhones than it is on HomePods. The ability to ask siri to play music is the whole reason I subscribe to iTunes Match or Apple Music.
In the early days of iPhone, I used an excellent app named StreamToMe for uncompressed audio streaming over the internet or any network from my home computer. It’s still a great app, but it doesn’t have hands free, virtual assistant capability.
The main problem I’ve had over many years is with Siri’s inability to search for, find, and play the album or song I ask it to. Even after discovering the “my albums” command to tell Siri to search my iTunes Match library and not my Apple Music library, I still have problems with Siri being able to identify my albums. The problem is less problematic on iPhones than it is on HomePods. The ability to ask siri to play music is the whole reason I subscribe to iTunes Match or Apple Music.
In the early days of iPhone, I used an excellent app named StreamToMe for uncompressed audio streaming over the internet or any network from my home computer. It’s still a great app, but it doesn’t have hands free, virtual assistant capability.
My biggest problem with Apple Music is that it quite often replaces the original album track with a live version (or different studio version from another album) if I have “sync my music library” activated.
Let’s say I want to play an album in Apple Music (in pristine, lossless sound - as found after a search on Apple Music), and in the album there’s this song called XYZ. If I happen to have the song XYZ in my library, featured on a live album, that I ripped several years ago (perhaps at the time when 128 kbs was “good enough”), Apple Music will quite often default to that version of the song. Yes, it’s the same song title, sung by the same artist, but from a completely different album. Thus breaking the flow of the album and it ruins the listening experience totally.
I wish there was a way to avoid this.
Let’s say I want to play an album in Apple Music (in pristine, lossless sound - as found after a search on Apple Music), and in the album there’s this song called XYZ. If I happen to have the song XYZ in my library, featured on a live album, that I ripped several years ago (perhaps at the time when 128 kbs was “good enough”), Apple Music will quite often default to that version of the song. Yes, it’s the same song title, sung by the same artist, but from a completely different album. Thus breaking the flow of the album and it ruins the listening experience totally.
I wish there was a way to avoid this.
If “sync my library” is unchecked, then Apple Music won’t turn on “match” and will leave my ripped music alone?
I could also make a copy of my music library and its files, and store it on an external so I have a copy of my ripped music that Apple Music can’t screw up?
I have my own comprehensive digital music library painstakingly curated from all my records, CDs and even a few tapes! There is no way I'm letting Apple anywhere near it. It will never happen. I simply don't trust them when it comes to iTunes Match or whatever it's called. I assume once you match it with Apple, they then delete your copy. What happens if they no longer have the rights to that song? Do you lose it? That'd be outrageous if you did.
Yes, if Apple no longer has rights to that song, they delete it from your library. It happens to me at least several times per year.
No, it doesn't delete your original copy.
And also never did I lose a song when they lost the rights to a song.
They will simply stop selling it, but if you bought or matched it, you can still download it.